nt right over them, sweeping the boat
from stem to stern; but as it had met the sea stern-on it was not
overturned. It was completely filled however, and some time was
necessarily lost in freeing it of water. The oars, being attached to
the sides of the boat by lanyards, were not carried away.

In a few minutes they had veered down under the lee of the wreck.

The crew and passengers of the "Nancy" were still clinging to the
cross-trees, benumbed and almost unable to speak or move when the
lifeboat approached. With the exception of Bax and Bluenose, they were
all so thoroughly exhausted as to have become comparatively indifferent
to, and therefore ignorant of, all that was going on around them. All
their energies were required to enable them simply to retain their
position on the rigging. At first the sight of the rockets from the
light-ship, and her lanterns gleaming in the far distance, had aroused
feelings of hope, but as hour after hour passed away the most of the
unhappy people fell into a sort of stupor or indifference, and the
lights were no longer regarded with hopeful looks.

When the lugger came towards them and anchored outside the Sands, it was
so dark that none but sharp eyes could make her out through the blinding
spray. Bax and Bluenose descried her, but both of them were so well
aware of the impossibility of a large boat venturing among the shoals
and breakers that they tacitly resolved not to acquaint their comrades
with its presence, lest they should raise false hopes, which, when
disappointed, might plunge them into still deeper despair.

Very different, however, were the feelings with which they beheld the
approach of the lifeboat, which the practised eye of Bax discerned long
before she came alongside.

"The lifeboat!" said Bax sharply in the ear of Bluenose, who was close
beside him. "Look! am I right?"

"So 'tis, I _do_ believe," cried the captain, staring intently in the
direction indicated by his friend's outstretched hand.

"Lifeboat ahoy!" shouted Bax, in a voice that rang loud and strong above
the whistling winds, like the blast of a brazen trumpet.

"Wreck ahoy!" cried the coxswain of the boat, and the cry, borne towards
them by the gale, fell upon the ears of those on the mast like the voice
of Hope shouting "Victory!" over the demon Despair.

"Cheer up, Lucy! Ho! comrades, look alive, here comes the lifeboat!"

Bax accompanied these words with active preparations for heav